The US Navy reached a modest but noteworthy milestone this week when it conducted an exercise with a Chinese ship off the coast of southern California, the top US commander for the Pacific region said on Friday.
The exercise, conducted on Wednesday, was the first in which ships from the two navies have worked directly with each other in a search and rescue training session.
In the operation, the crews of a US ship and a Chinese ship practiced how to save a third ship from fire and flooding while evacuating casualties.
The regional commander, Admiral William Fallon, cast the exercise as a step toward a deeper relationship he hopes to foster between the militaries.
The admiral has visited China three times and said he achieved a minor breakthrough in May when the Chinese allowed him to sit in the cockpit of China's advanced FB-7 warplane.
"Frankly, from the military side we have not been very engaged with these folks in the last five years," Fallon told a group of reporters. "We are attempting to build a new relationship to try to establish a foundation and ... some level of trust."
But the US government has never been of one mind on the value of military exchanges with Beijing.
The heads of the US Pacific Command have favored establishing a channel of communication with their Chinese counterparts, figuring it would enable them to dispel misperceptions about US intentions and defuse the sort of crisis that erupted in 2001 when a Chinese fighter and a US reconnaissance plane collided off the coast of China.
But some Bush administration civilians and advisers have been far more skeptical, calculating that the principal Chinese interest is to glean what they can about US military technology and operations while withholding useful information about their own activities and budgets.
Fallon alluded to those differences.
"It isn't a clone of the Soviet Union," he said, referring to China. "However, there are institutions of our government that seem to act in a manner that has just transferred whatever we thought the Soviet Union was, and we have moved it into China and we kind of do things in the same manner, which I think is incorrect."
In the Wednesday exercise, the crew of the US destroyer Shoup worked with the crew of the Chinese destroyer Qingdao. The Swamp Fox, a torpedo recovery vessel, played the role of the ship in distress. The Qingdao and the Hongzehu, a Chinese oiler, visited San Diego as part of the exchange.
The exercise is to be followed by a more complex search and rescue exercise off the coast of China, Fallon said.
But there is a long way to go to build stronger ties. Among other things, US and Chinese officials have never drafted procedures on avoiding military incidents like the one that took place in 2001.
Congress has also imposed restrictions on the scope of the exchanges, forbidding contacts that would enhance the Chinese military's combat, logistical or surveillance capabilities.
The Burmese junta has said that detained former leader Aung San Suu Kyi is “in good health,” a day after her son said he has received little information about the 80-year-old’s condition and fears she could die without him knowing. In an interview in Tokyo earlier this week, Kim Aris said he had not heard from his mother in years and believes she is being held incommunicado in the capital, Naypyidaw. Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, was detained after a 2021 military coup that ousted her elected civilian government and sparked a civil war. She is serving a
Seven wild Asiatic elephants were killed and a calf was injured when a high-speed passenger train collided with a herd crossing the tracks in India’s northeastern state of Assam early yesterday, local authorities said. The train driver spotted the herd of about 100 elephants and used the emergency brakes, but the train still hit some of the animals, Indian Railways spokesman Kapinjal Kishore Sharma told reporters. Five train coaches and the engine derailed following the impact, but there were no human casualties, Sharma said. Veterinarians carried out autopsies on the dead elephants, which were to be buried later in the day. The accident site
‘NO AMNESTY’: Tens of thousands of people joined the rally against a bill that would slash the former president’s prison term; President Lula has said he would veto the bill Tens of thousands of Brazilians on Sunday demonstrated against a bill that advanced in Congress this week that would reduce the time former president Jair Bolsonaro spends behind bars following his sentence of more than 27 years for attempting a coup. Protests took place in the capital, Brasilia, and in other major cities across the nation, including Sao Paulo, Florianopolis, Salvador and Recife. On Copacabana’s boardwalk in Rio de Janeiro, crowds composed of left-wing voters chanted “No amnesty” and “Out with Hugo Motta,” a reference to the speaker of the lower house, which approved the bill on Wednesday last week. It is
REVENGE: Trump said he had the support of the Syrian government for the strikes, which took place in response to an Islamic State attack on US soldiers last week The US launched large-scale airstrikes on more than 70 targets across Syria, the Pentagon said on Friday, fulfilling US President Donald Trump’s vow to strike back after the killing of two US soldiers. “This is not the beginning of a war — it is a declaration of vengeance,” US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth wrote on social media. “Today, we hunted and we killed our enemies. Lots of them. And we will continue.” The US Central Command said that fighter jets, attack helicopters and artillery targeted ISIS infrastructure and weapon sites. “All terrorists who are evil enough to attack Americans are hereby warned
RSS